


Proof

by somehowunbroken



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Body Horror, Bodyswap, Gen, Ladystuck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-28
Updated: 2012-12-28
Packaged: 2017-11-22 17:44:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/612502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/somehowunbroken/pseuds/somehowunbroken
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Roxy knows what she's doing. There are wrenches all up in these works, sure, but she'll figure it out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Proof

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Miss Mend (Clockworkkey)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Clockworkkey/gifts).



> This was written for Ladystuck 2012. The prompt I used was: Meenah Peixes, Roxy Lalonde. Body switch, and body horror. Somehow the two of them wind up in each other's forms and actually get into the psychological implications of such an act. Doesn't matter if they get romantic or not; I just want some good old fashioned body horror and interaction between the both of them.
> 
> Thanks to ariadne83 for beta services!

The thing is, you know what you’re doing here.

Your mom left you books about science and math and history, complete with tutorial programs and practice sets. You started them out of some bizarre sense that it would somehow make her proud, and you finished them because you realized along the way that this stuff might actually be useful someday.

Past you was right. You’d all be totally screwed now without the knowledge that you forced yourself to learn. You’ve uncovered the purposes of seven different machines in the lab on the meteor already, and two of them have become pretty vital to the way things are done around here.

So yes, you know what you’re doing. The problem is that it’s impossible to convince Batterwitch the Younger of this fact.

She creeps you out, if you’re being honest with yourself. She’s not your nemesis, not the one who murdered your mom and Dirk’s Bro all those years ago. She isn’t the troll you grew up despising with every cell in your body, but the only thing separating Meenah from the Batterwitch is a weird twist of fate and a scratch in their session. You know exactly what she’s capable of doing, and it freaks you right the fuck out.

Unfortunately, the reverse isn’t true.

“So what the glub is this?” she asks, poking at the interface on one of the machines in the lab. You consider not answering her, you really do, but you know from experience that if you ignore her she’ll just get louder and closer to you in an attempt to get you to answer. You sigh and look up from your equations just in time to see her smack her hand against a button.

“Can you go explore somewhere else?” you ask, but she cuts you off with a frown.

“Oh shit, Lalonde, I can’t move my hand,” she says, panicked. She’s leaning away from the console, and you can see the muscles in her arm straining to pull away from the machine. You set your notebook down and walk towards her, looking more fully at the machine in question. It’s not one you’re familiar with; you’d marked it “check this out later” while taking inventory, and haven’t been back to it since.

“Stay still,” you instruct. There’s pretty much a zero percent chance that it’s going to happen, but it can’t hurt to try.

Sure enough, Meenah starts flailing around when you bend closer to the machine. “Lalonde, you gotta get me off of this fin, I can’t do anyfin while I’m attached to a machine, what if it eats my glubbin hand-”

“Meenah,” you snap. She doesn’t stop moving, but she does close her mouth. You’re thankful for the small miracles at this point. You turn your attention back to the machine, studying it for any clues as to why it isn’t letting Junior Sea Hitler away.

It isn’t very forthcoming. The letters are Alternian, which you’ve been able to read for as long as you’ve known English, but they don’t say anything. It’s like someone got drunk and keyboard smashed all over the label maker.

“I don’t know what it says,” you say. This is apparently the wrong answer, because Meenah starts yelling and yanking even harder on her arm. You snap your fingers until she focuses on you, and then point to the label. “Does this mean anything to you?”

“Nofin,” she says, squinting at the letters. “It looks like someone let Captor near a keyboard on a bad day. It’s just letters.”

“Fuck,” you sigh. “Okay, I’m going to go-”

“No,” she screeches, reaching her free hand in your direction. You flinch away, but it’s not far enough to prevent her from brushing her fingers against your arm.

The machine beeps loudly, there’s a flash of light, and you fall to the floor.

-0-

The first thing you hear when you come to is swearing.

Correction, you think muzzily, the first thing you hear is _yourself_ swearing, which doesn’t make any goddamned sense, because your lips are firmly shut.

“What the fuck,” you say. Well, that’s what you mean to do, but your teeth slide through your tongue on “the”, and you spend most of “fuck” spitting out blood.

Pink blood. You spit _pink fucking blood_ into you _gray fucking hand_ , and oh, fuck, no, no no no-

“Lalonde,” Meenah shrieks in your voice, and you look up at yourself, your body, your hair and clothes and freaked-out eyes.

“Meenah,” you try, careful about the fangs this time. “What the fuck did you do?”

“I didn’t do anyfin,” she protests. The words are too round, almost blurry-sounding, and you dimly realize that it’s because she’s used to avoiding the fangs. Fangs that your body doesn’t have, that she no longer has to accommodate for.

“Bullshit,” you spit, sharp and angry and hissing. You wipe more blood from Meenah’s mouth and thrust a hand at her, pink smeared across gray. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, Peixes, but this ain’t normal!”

“Where are my fangs?” Meenah asks, sticking your tongue out and chomping at it. You watch as she bites down harder and harder without drawing blood and curl Meenah’s tongue away from her fangs in response. She pulls your tongue back into your mouth and clenches your fists. “How the fuck do you even bite things with these shitty teeth?”

“Open, insert, close,” you rattle off, staring down at Meenah’s hands. They’re troll hands, from one clawed finger to the next and back again, sharp and too fucking gray to be mistaken for your own. You squeeze them into fists and feel the prick of the claws against Meenah’s palms, enough to warn but not to tear.

Fuck, Jegus, these claws could rip through your skin like it was butterfly wings. If you curl Meenah’s fists any tighter they’ll rip through her skin, and it’s a hell of a lot thicker than your own.

“You have to fix this,” Meenah yells. She’s closer to you now, right in your face, and you reach out to shove her away and end up tossing her halfway back across the lab. You hear your body hit the ground with an awful crunching sound and Meenah shrieks, long and loud.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” you swear, moving and kneeling beside your body. Meenah stares up at you, your pupils dilated so you can barely see the pink around them. She’s breathing funny, low and fast, and fuck fuck _fuck_ , that’s your body going into shock.

“Get the fuck away from her,” you hear from the doorway, and you turn to see Dirk walking towards you, leaning forward and using his height to his advantage. You reach for him automatically, but instead of leaning in for your customary hug, he grabs your arm and yanks you up, turning so he can back you up a few steps before dumping you unceremoniously on the ground. You blink up at him as he turns back to-

Your body. Right.

“Roxy,” he says quietly, kneeling by your body and grabbing your hand. “Come on, Rox, breathe.”

“Dirk,” you say. He doesn’t turn, not that you were really expecting him to. “This is going to sound a little weird, but I’m Roxy. Me, over here, looking like a troll.”

“Not in the mood, Peixes,” Dirk says flatly, brushing his fingers across your forehead. “Roxy, calm down for me. I’m right here.”

“I’m freaking the fuck out,” you shout at his back. You forget to pull Meenah’s tongue back and end up spitting more blood into her hand. “You’re over there and I’m over here and you won’t fucking believe me. Stop fucking comforting her and give me a hug or something before I actually flip my shit, would you?”

Dirk freezes, his hand hovering over your face. “Say that again.”

“Get your ass over here,” you say, remembering at the last second not to curl Meenah’s fists too tightly. “I am freaking the fuck out, and if you don’t give me some kind of hug in the next ten seconds, I’m going to straight up _stab something_.”

“Roxy,” Dirk says and, miracle of miracles, drops your hand and turns to look you in the eyes.

“Hug,” you demand, way more shakily than you’d meant that to come out. “Nine seconds, Di-Stri.”

He’s by your side in a flash, arms wrapping around Meenah’s shoulders, pulling you in for a hug. Your head hurts and you’re weirded out and scared, but you try really hard not to cry bizarre pink tears onto Dirk’s shoulder.

You fail miserably.

“It’s okay,” he says, pushing his face into Meenah’s weird troll hair and kissing her skull. You close Meenah’s eyes and do your best to pretend, to just enjoy the feeling of your moirail’s arms around you, but there’s really no avoiding the fact that something is fantastically not right in the world. “Shoosh, Rox, we’ll figure out what the hell happened.”

“How did you know?” you ask. The words get muffled in his shirt, but he tightens his arms and doesn’t let you pull Meenah’s body away from him.

“Fish puns,” he says, and you feel the curve of his smile against Meenah’s head. “Rather, a sincere lack of them. Have you ever known her to actually not use them?”

“No,” you say, opening Meenah’s eyes and taking a deep breath. You feel a little steadier as you push away and peer over Dirk’s shoulder to look at your body. “Uh, speaking of, though. I threw her kind of hard.”

Dirk sighs and turns back around. “If you broke your own bones, Lalonde, we’re going to have words.”

You smile briefly. There’s something ridiculously calming about Dirk’s bullshit in times of stress.

Meenah has closed your eyes, but it doesn’t hide that your body is in shock. Dirk tells you to hold your hands above your head while he checks for injuries, and Meenah doesn’t stir as you bring your wrists to the floor above your head and press down gently. Jegus, if this is the amount of restraint that the trolls always have to use when dealing with the humans, you haven’t been giving them enough credit.

Meenah groans as Dirk moves his hands over your body, poking and prodding as he goes. There’s a sharp intake of breath as Dirk presses against your left calf, and a shrill cry when he repeats his motion. He frowns as he looks up at you. “This might be broken. We should probably look at it.”

You stare at him for a moment, and he raises an eyebrow. “Stockings, Roxy. I’m guessing you’d rather undress yourself than have me do it.”

“Oh,” you mumble. The tips of Meenah’s cheeks burn; you suppose you’re probably blushing bright pink. You shuffle down and shove your skirt up, grabbing the top of your leggings and tugging slightly. “Um, grab the – hips. Lift a little.”

Dirk complies and you tug, pulling the leggings down until you reach your shoes. You pull those off as well, and when you look back up at your leg, there’s an ugly purple bruise already starting to show on the calf. “Ah, fuck.”

“Yeah, that’s not great,” Dirk says, leaning over and setting his fingers gently against the edges of the bruise. He pushes slightly, working his fingers in towards the center, and Meenah cries out again. Dirk pulls back after a moment. “Pretty sure it’s fractured, but it’s not too bad, all things considered.”

“So much for my record of never having broken a bone,” you mutter, sitting back and watching as Dirk leans over your face. He grabs your chin and gently pries your eye open with his thumb.

“Shock,” he says, which is no surprise to you. “If I had to guess, she wasn’t prepared for that to hurt as much as it did.”

“I didn’t mean to throw her,” you say.

Dirk looks up at you. “If I had to guess,” he says, “you weren’t prepared to be twenty times as strong as you normally are.”

You look down at Meenah’s hands. Her fingers curl when you tell them to; her wrists turn when you try to look at her palms. Her claws bite into her skin, and you feel the tiny pinpricks of pain as it parts around them.

“I don’t know what to do,” you say, pressing Meenah’s claws further into her skin and watching as her blood wells up in the cuts. “Dirk, I have no idea – what if we’re stuck this way?”

“Like fuck,” your voice snarls, and you look down at your face in surprise. Meenah is staring up at you, squinting and shaking a little. “This body is squishy and floppy and I can’t sea worth a glubbin fuck. You better march my sweet ass back over there and figure somefin out, because if I have to spend the rest of my life as a blind pufferfish, I swear that ‘the rest of my life’ will not be very long.”

“You’re already dead,” Dirk points out.

“Exactly,” Meenah says, and closes your eyes again. “That is exactly my point, Strider.”

You glance over at Dirk, who shrugs as he bends back down to tend to your leg. You shrug back. Well, okay. As long as it doesn’t make sense to either of you, you can just ignore it.

“Okay,” you mutter, turning to the machine that had switched you into this body in the first place. “Time to do some science.”

“Attagirl,” Meenah says from the floor. “Science.”

You choose to ignore her as you walk to the machine and start to look it over. It’ll take some time, sure, but you’ll figure it out. First you’ll have to figure out how to type with weird troll claws, but fuck it, you’re Roxy Lalonde. You can do it.

You know what you’re doing here.

Time to prove it.

**Author's Note:**

> I've never written anything quite like this before, so I'm not sure if this is exactly what you were going for. I hope you enjoyed it anyway, Miss Mend :)


End file.
